Thursday, June 2, 2016

Just Announced Keynote Speakers and Industry Guests (more details below):

Professor Henry Jenkins – Provost Professor of Communication, Journalism, Cinematic Arts and Education at University of Southern California and the author of landmark fan and transmedia research including Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide

It is hard to imagine a time when superheroes have been more pervasive in popular culture. As one of our most beloved folkloric traditions these costume-clad adventurers have become a means to negotiate and articulate identities in response to fictional heroes. Superhero identities range from those that symbolise a nation, to web communities that use cosplay to challenge gender roles, and the people of a city coming together under the banner of a caped crusader. This symposium will examine the many intersections between superheroes and identity. From big screen heroes to lesser-known comic book vigilantes and real-life costumed heroes, the symposium will include papers that consider superheroes across all eras and media platforms

We are inviting submissions for individual research papers of 20 minutes as well as pre-formed panels. Proposal topics might include, but are not limited to, the following areas:

Super-Activism

One of the central tenets of the superhero story is the transition of unassuming civilians into costume-clad heroes. This narrative is not confined to the comic book page as the people of San Francisco demonstrated when they came together to realise the adventures of Batkid. Proposals are invited that consider how superheroes have become icons of activism and community engagement.

National and Regional Identities

Comic books are often considered an American form, and the medium's most popular character, the superhero, did much to affirm that link with dozens of star-spangled heroes created during the industry's Golden Age. However, the superhero has been reimagined in a range of contexts to respond to local cultures, politics, and traditions. Papers that consider how superheroes engage with national and regional identities are welcome.

Secret Identities

The masquerade and imaginative possibilities of superheroes, coupled with their high concept settings, have allowed these characters to engage with issues and interests that were often difficult to tackle in more "grounded" stories. Papers that consider how superheroes address topics such as gender, sexuality, and ethnicity are invited.

Audiences, Fans, and Superheroes

Whether it is t-shirts adorned with a familiar logo or convention cosplay and fan fiction, superheroes compel participation. We encourage papers that examine the range of this engagement from casual movie audiences to avid consumers.

Supervillains

The supervillain is often understood as the hero's dark double. This symposium welcomes papers that consider the identitiesof the supervillains, and their relationship to the above topics.

The Superhero Identities symposium is organised by the Superheroes & Me research team – Angela Ndalianis (University of Melbourne), Liam Burke (Swinburne University of Technology), Elizabeth MacFarlane (University of Melbourne), Wendy Haslem (University of Melbourne), and Ian Gordon (National University of Singapore) – and supported by the Australian Research Council (ARC) and Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI).

Proposals of 250-300 words for individual presentations or full panels, as well as any queries, should be sent to wburke@swin.edu.au by June 24, 2016, along with a 150-word bio.

Keynote Speakers and Industry Guests

Professor Henry Jenkins

Henry Jenkins joined USC from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was Peter de Florez Professor in the Humanities. He directed MIT's Comparative Media Studies graduate degree program from 1993-2009, setting an innovative research agenda during a time of fundamental change in communication, journalism and entertainment.

As one of the first media scholars to chart the changing role of the audience in an environment of increasingly pervasive digital content, Jenkins has been at the forefront of understanding the effects of participatory media on society, politics and culture. His research gives key insights to the success of social-networking websites, networked computer games, online fan communities and other advocacy organizations, and emerging news media outlets.

Paul Dini

Paul Dini is the Emmy, Eisner, and Annie Award-winning writer of some of the most popular superhero stories ever across animation, film, comics, and games. He is co-creator of the Batman: The Animated Series and related shows and films Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, Superman: The Animated Series, and Batman Beyond. While working on Batman, Dini co-created fan favourite character Harley Quinn who makes her film debut in August's Suicide Squad.Moving to games, Dini is the writer of the best-selling Batman: Arkham Asylum game.

His 2016 graphic novel Dark Night: A True Batman Story is a harrowing and eloquent autobiographical tale of Dini's courageous struggle to overcome a desperate situation.

Hope Larson is the New York Times bestselling author of six graphic novels, notably her graphic novel adaptation of Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time (Farrar, Straus and Giroux), and co-creator of Boom! Comics' Goldie Vance. Forthcoming projects include two graphic novels, Compass South and Knife's Edge (Farrar, Straus & Giroux) and, starting in July 2016, a reimagining of DC Comics' Batgirl. Her short comics have been published by the New York Times, Vertigo, and in several anthologies, including Flight and DC Comics' Gotham Academy Yearbook.

In addition to her comics work, Larson has explored filmmaking. She is the writer and director of two short projects. Bitter Orange, starring Brie Larson, James Urbaniak and Brendan Hines, is a tale of crime in 1920s Hollywood. Did We Live Too Fast is a Twilight Zone-inspired music video created for Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Dan the Automator's band, Got A Girl; it was used as the centerpiece of their 2015 tour.

Larson has been nominated for cartooning awards in the US, Canada and Europe, and is the recipient of a two Eisner Awards and an Ignatz. She holds a BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She currently lives in Los Angeles.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

"NY 101" New York City According to Brian WoodMartin Lund1Desert (E)Scapes: Cinematic Visions in Road StoryJanis BreckenridgeJohn Gardner34GANTZ Interpreted from Two Critical PerspectivesMotoko Tanaka49"The Good Duck Artist": How Carl Barks Changed ComicsTom Speelman67A la recherche du chien perdu: Watch Dogs, Memory, and Mourning in Recuerdos de perrito de mierda (Shitty Little Dog Memories)Ryan Prout82The Foundations of the Anglo-American Tradition of Political Satire and Comic Art: The Eighteenth and Nineteenth CenturiesRichard Scully98An Alternative History of Canadian CartoonistsDominick Grace133Alberto Breccia: Memoirs of Resistance and the Ethos of ReadingAarnoud Rommens162Fatal Attractions: AIDS and American Superhero Comics, 1988-1994Sean A. Guynes177Conceptualizing the Freedom of the Press in Chinese Political CartoonsJames Yi Guo217Little Princess and the Mayor: Evaluating Cartoons on a Sex ScandalMike Lloyd238A Comment on the Impact of Cartoon Art on Social and Political Events with a Special Reference to the Case of TurkeyLevent Gonenc and Levent Cantck256Chasing the American Dream: Gender, Race, and Identity in American Born Chinese and ShortcomingsKirsten Mollegaard275Revenant Landscapes in The Walking DeadJulia Round295"We are the walking dead": Zombified Spaces, Mobility, and the Potential for Security in Post-9/11 Zombie ComicsJessika 0. Griffin309The Glimmering Glow of Comic Art Amidst the Blinding Glitter of the United Arab EmiratesJohn A. Lent329Pioneers in Comic Art ScholarshipA Comics Studies Pioneer In Portugal: Antonio Dias de DeusDomingos lsabelinho346'Pioneers in Comic Art Scholarship"Struggling Independently to Understand the World": My Career in Comics Scholarship and CreationLeonard Rifas362The Comic Book Film Adaptation --A Panel Discussion with Torn Brevoort, Joe Kelly, Michael E. Uslan, and Mark WaidLiam Burke375Talibanization in Pakistan -- An Uneasy Subject for Editorial CartoonistsNaveed Iqbal ChaudhryAmoa Ashraf395The Next Generation of Comics ScholarsThe System ls in The System: Researching the Visualization of Abstract Systems in Peter Kuper's Graphic Novel The SystemLuka Hamacher421A Brief Introduction to Some Iranian Women Cartoonists and Their WorksJohn A. Lent441Surface Race Resolution: Race Commodification in Marvel Premiere's Series Featuring Black PantherDanielle Cochran457Images of African Americans in the Golden Age of Comics (1939-1965)William H. Foster Ill478Batul: The Great DisciplinarianSourav Chatterjee492The Translation Practices of Manga ScanlatorsMatteo Fabbretti509Manga and Silent Film: Building a Bridge Between Modern Gitaigo, Giongo, and the BenshiKay K. Clopton530There's Life in Other Systems: The Comic Character Outside NarrativesJoiio Batista Freitas CardosoRoberto Elisio dos Santos547Sequential Images, the Page, and Narrative StructuresJakob F. Dittmar561Visual Character and Context of Put On (1931-1965): The First Indonesian ComicsToni Masdiono and Iwan Zahar572Sinann Cheah InterviewPhilip Smith586An Interview with Canadian Webcornic Creator Becka KinzieJeffery Klaehn591I Don't Know, Give It a Try, See What HappensMark Anderson600Digital Comic Adaptation and Adjustment: Conceptual Boundaries in Comic Book RecognitionDamien Tomaselli

Monday, February 15, 2016

Here are the rules and regulations:1. The theme for the 16th International Editorial Cartoon Competition is:

The "right" to be forgotten

In a 2014 decision by the Court of Justice of the European Union, a Spanish lawyer was granted the right to have a previous brush with justice deleted from Google search on his name.

While protection of one's privacy is an essential right, erasing public records could have untold consequences.Could this decision jeopardize the reliability of the Internet and make research by journalists and historians impossible?Could this precedent lead to the breakdown of the Internet and the creation of national networks vulnerable to state censorship?

2. Prizes: three prizes will be given: a first prize of $1000 plus a Certificate from Canadian UNESCO, second and third prizes of $500. All sums are in Canadian dollars. Ten additional cartoons will receive an 'Award of Excellence,' Regrettably no financial remuneration accompanies the Awards of Excellence.

3. Only one cartoon will be accepted from each cartoonist. It may be either in color or black and white and must not have won an award.

4. The size of the cartoon should not exceed A4; 21 by 29.2 cm; or 8.50 by 11 inches.

5. The name, address, telephone number and a short biography of the cartoonist must be included in the submission.

6. The Canadian Committee for World Press Freedom shall have the rights to use any of the cartoons entered in the Competition for promotion of our Editorial Cartoon Competition and World Press Freedom Day.

7. The winners of the Cartoon Competition will be announced at the World Press Freedom Day Luncheon held at the Chateau Laurier in Ottawa, Canada on Tuesday May 3, 2016 as well as being advised by e-mail. The winner's names and their cartoons will be posted on the CCWFP web site.

8. The winning cartoons will be exhibited at the luncheon.

The deadline for receipt of cartoons is 5 p.m. GMT, Friday, April 1, 2016.Send submissions by e-mail to : info@ccwpf-cclpm.caCartoons should be in jpeg format at 300 dpi

Saturday, February 13, 2016

I received my copy of IJOCA 17-2 today. It's got 663 pages. Article topics include Carl Barks, African-American images in comics, Antonio Dias de Deus, comics movies, Indonesia, AIDS, China, GANTZ, British prints, Canadian cartoonists, Brian Wood, the UAE, zombies, scanlation and a bunch of other stuff. Mark Anderson of Andertoons also reprises his how to make money with cartoons talk from the 2015 National Cartoonist Society meeting.

Friday, December 11, 2015

The Swann Foundation for Caricature and Cartoon, administered by the Library of Congress is accepting applications for its graduate fellowship, one of the few in the field, for the 2016-2017 academic year. Deadline for applications is February 15, 2016. For criteria, guidelines, and application forms, please see:

When the Argentine Roberto Fontanarrosa passed away in 2007, a national day of mourning was declared and his funeral was attended by thousands. Although Fontanarrosa was much loved and both the man and his works have received public recognition time and again, there are very few published academic works on his œuvreto this day. This proposed anthology seeks to fill this gap by paying attention to Fontanarrosa's work as a whole.

We therefore invite papers in English, Spanish or Portuguese that consider any aspect of Fontanarrosa's œuvre, including but not limited to:

-short stories and novels

-comics

-cinema and theatre

-interviews and public addresses (such as his famous speech on "Las malas palabras")

Abstracts of 1000 words and a short CV should be sent to fontanarrosaproject@gmail.com by 31 December 2015 for consideration. Please write your family name(s) and "Fontanarrosa project" in the subject line. If accepted, full papers will be due on 31 May 2016.

Llamado a propuestas de contribuciones para edición académica: Todo Fontanarrosa: la obra de un completo humorista / All Fontanarrosa: The Work of a Complete Humourist

Tuesday, September 1, 2015

ICAF, the International Comic Arts Forum, invites proposals for scholarly papers for its eighteenth annual meeting, to be held at the University of South Carolina in Columbia, from Thursday, April 14, through Saturday, April 16, 2016. Confirmed guests include comics artists Howard Cruse, Keith Knight, Cece Bell, and Prof. Michael Chaney of Dartmouth College.

The deadline to submit proposals is November 6, 2015.

ICAF welcomes original proposals from diverse disciplines and theoretical perspectives on any aspect of comics or cartooning, particularly studies that reflect an international perspective. Studies of aesthetics, production, distribution, reception, and social, ideological, and historical significance are equally welcome, as are studies that address larger theoretical issues linked to comics or cartooning, for example in image/text studies or new media theory.

Among the thematic panels we hope to offer are Comics and the American South, Digital and Online Comics, and Superheroes; proposals are especially welcome in these areas.

PROPOSAL GUIDELINES: ICAF prefers argumentative, thesis-driven papers that are clearly linked to larger critical, artistic, or cultural issues; we avoid presentations that are summative or survey-like in character. We only accept original 20-minute papers that have not been presented or accepted for publication elsewhere. Presenters should assume an audience versed in comics and the fundamentals of comics studies. Where possible, papers should be illustrated by relevant images on PowerPoint. Proposals should not exceed 300 words.

REVIEW PROCESS: All proposals will be subject to blind review. Due to high interest in the conference, in recent years ICAF has typically been able to accept only about half of the proposals received.

SEND ABSTRACTS (with contact information, including state, province, or country of residence in the body of the email) by 6 November 2015, to C.W. Marshall, ICAF Academic Program Director, via email at <toph.marshall@ubc.ca>.

Receipt of all proposals will be acknowledged. Applicants should expect to receive confirmation of acceptance or rejection by December 14, 2015.

ICAF also sponsors the John A. Lent Scholarship in Comics Studies. This scholarship is awarded to a current student who has authored, or is in the process of authoring, a substantial research-based writing project about comics. Applications for this scholarship are due by 8 January 2016. For more information and details of the application process, please visit our website.